Trials and Temptations
by avanti90
Summary: The treason trial of Miles Vorkosigan.


The banners fluttered in the breeze over the battlements of Vorhartung Castle as Count Vortala's groundcar came to a halt before the massive gates. The old Count waited impatiently as his armsmen carefully helped him out of the car and into the float chair, adjusting the ornate scarlet and silver robe around him. He knew perfectly well that it looked ridiculous on his wizened old body. He probably looked exactly like the clown they called him.

Georgos was waiting for him at the gates. "How does the vote look?" asked Vortala, before he could open his mouth. "Evenly balanced, more or less," Georgos answered as they passed into the castle. On the roof above, a Vorbarra armsman raised a black and gold banner to join the others assembled. "But Aral was hoping you could swing a few more votes – ah, there he is. Count Vorkosigan!"

Aral turned from where he was standing at the door to the council chamber, his face lighting up with obvious relief. "So there you are, boy," Vortala greeted him. "How did you manage to get yourself into this mess? I thought I was leaving the job in good hands. Two years without me and look what happens."

Aral spread his hands. "Miles," he sighed. One word said it all.

Vortala snorted in perfect understanding, surveying the boy. Too much gray hair. Were even the children getting old now? None of the absurd frills and robes for Aral, of course. The boy had always preferred being a soldier to everything else. And today the glittering parade uniform was undoubtedly a political statement as well, a reminder of what he had been and done for Barrayar, a reminder that none of them would be alive today if not for him.

"Don't worry, boy," he whispered. "This wrinkled old clown still has a few tricks up his sleeve."

They entered the council chamber together. He could see heads turning and whispers breaking out all over the room as Aral escorted him to his place. He was back to the old battlefield again, thinking in the old ways, watching the familiar faces around them, measuring their expressions. Were they impressed by the show of support, or did they see it as a sign of just how desperate Aral had become?

The whispers came to a sudden halt as the door behind the empty dais swung open. Vortala turned the float chair around to look as the Emperor entered. Gregor looked pale and tired, but still resplendent in his full ceremonial parade uniform covered with gold braid and glitter, the only thing in the room that outshone Aral Vorkosigan's sea of medals. Vortala glanced around the room. Clearly, the statement was not lost on anyone.

He sighed softly to himself. Sixteen years spent fighting to put Ezar's grandson on his throne, and now just two years later they had to struggle all over again to stop him from destroying it. Ezar had predicted the boy would be an idiot. But Ezar couldn't have imagined this.

Georgos took his place on the floor of the Council. One of the Vorbarra armsmen handed him a cavalry spear bearing the Vorbarra pennon. The spear struck the wooden plaque set in the floor, the sound echoing around the chamber. "My Imperial Master recognizes Count Vordrozda," he called out. "Come forward, my lord."

Silence descended upon the council of counts as Count Vordrozda rose and took his place in the speaker's circle. The battle had begun.

* * *

The opening skirmishes lasted for five days. Each morning's session began in the same way – with Georgos summoning Lord Vorkosigan, and after one minute of almost funereal silence passing the circle to Count Vordrozda with obvious distaste. Vordrozda paraded witnesses and evidence through the chamber, all of them unchallenged. There was no defendant and no defence, unless one counted Aral and Georgos exchanging hand signals across the room.

Count Vortala slept comfortably through most of it. It was irrelevant. The real trial was happening outside, as he and Aral traded favors and promises with the Counts in between sessions, and Lady Alys worked their wives. They were all three masters of the political game, they had won countless votes like this in the days of the Regency, votes that everyone else in the government had given up for dead. Let that upstart Vordrozda bring his ImpSec agents and their testimony. Vortala was confident of victory.

He awoke when Simon Illyan marched into the chamber, trailed by two worried men in Imperial livery. The disgraced chief of ImpSec looked pale from his month's confinement, but otherwise unharmed. Vordrozda immediately launched into a dramatic description of Illyan's failed attempt to cover up the supposed treason plot. Illyan watched him in silence with a murderous expression on his face, his hands occasionally edging towards an imaginary nerve disruptor at his belt. Aral shot him a warning look and he subsided.

Vortala stayed awake, because the next witness was the commandant of the Imperial Service Academy. Major Cecil answered Vordrozda's questions in monosyllables, giving both Vordrozda and Gregor the glare he reserved for dimwitted cadets. Yes, Lord Vorpatril had disappeared from the Academy grounds without leave or orders. No, he had left no word, no indication of where he was going. No, he had never mentioned any reason to go to Beta Colony. No, he knew nothing of any mercenaries or plots to take over the Imperium, and frankly if he had a secret message to send Cadet Vorpatril would be the last man on the planet he'd choose to send it with.

"Tell me, Major," said Count Vorkosigan in the silence that followed this statement, "as a tactician, what would you think of a plan that called for thirty mercenary ships to conquer and hold a heavily fortified planet protected by a fleet of two hundred?"

Cecil snapped to attention. "I would say that whoever came up with it must be the biggest tactical idiot of the century, and if he was in the Academy I'd have him sent to Kyril Island to do laundry for the rest of his life. Sir."

Vordrozda's eyes flashed in anger. "Count Vorkosigan," he said sharply, "you are not the accused in this trial. You do not have the right of cross-examination."

He was too late. Vortala could see smiles on more than a few Counts' faces. Having made his point, Aral flicked a hand unobtrusively in Georgos's direction, the cue for the session to adjourn.

Vortala brought his float-chair close to Aral as the Counts filed out of the door. "I've got you Vorvayne and Voraronberg," he muttered. "And possibly an abstension by Vorkalloner. Should be enough."

"It should," Aral agreed. "But there's something worrying me. Vordrozda has asked for a day's delay - to obtain important evidence, he says. He has something significant up his sleeve, and I have no idea what it is."

Vortala shrugged. "We have a majority," he assured Aral. "A thin majority, but it'll hold. Don't worry about Vordrozda. How bad can it be?"

* * *

He found out a day later, when the tight-lipped armsman in imperial livery distributed the flimsies to every desk. Vortala stared down in amazement at the rows of numbers laid out before him. He looked across at Aral and saw the same amazement mirrored in his face, slowly giving way to barely controlled rage. Yes, Count Vordrozda would need to have a damned good explanation if he hoped to get away with _this__._

"This, my lords," declared Count Vordrozda, waving the original dramatically in the air, "is the personal account statement of Prime Minister Count Vorkosigan." There was utter silence in the council. Vortala didn't think anyone was so much as breathing. What the hell did Vordrozda think he was doing?

His voice rose, carrying to every corner of the chamber. "I call your attention to the entry marked for your benefit - two hundred and seventy five thousand marks, disappeared without a trace two years ago. Where, I ask you, did this princely sum go, and why was no record kept of its purpose?"

He paused theatrically. "Observe the date, my lords. The day of our Emperor's majority, when Count Vorkosigan was forced to lay down the Imperial power he held for sixteen years. Can you now doubt, my lords, that this is no mere boy's foolishness, but something far older and far more insidious? The surrender of the regency was merely an act to hide his true intentions, while his real plan came to fruition in the background. And now Lord Vorkosigan has taken command of the fleet his father prepared for him, given it its true name and its true purpose at last, and even as we speak, he prepares to lead it against Barrayar!"

He spun around and raised his robed arm to point one finger at the former Regent. "He claims he is not responsible for the actions of his son. He claims he knows nothing of the whereabouts of his nephew. Can he claim he knows nothing of this? If our Prime Minister is so blameless, let him explain where this money went!"

He was met by stunned silence. Vortala couldn't hold back a smile. Oh, the fool. He'd constructed his monstrous tower of cards on one flimsy piece of evidence, and now Aral would bring it down in one stroke. He sat up expectantly, waiting for Aral to teach the young upstart a lesson he'd never forget. All around him, men turned in the same direction, their eyes resting on the Prime Minister. Waiting. Wondering.

Aral's eyes went once to Gregor and then back to the assembly. "As has been pointed out," he said calmly, "I am not the accused in this trial. This council has no authority to make me divulge details of my personal expenditure. Not yet."

Triumph was written clearly on Vordrozda's face. The rest of the council stared at Aral. Gregor's face had gone dark.

Count Vortrifrani's voice broke the silence, ringing out from the opposite side of the chamber. "Explain!" More voices took up the cry, so readily that it had to have been prepared. Vortala clenched his hands on the sides of his float chair and tried to speak, but he couldn't make himself heard above the clamor.

At least one man in the chamber had courage. "Wait!" shouted Count Vorob'yev over the noise. "Will Count Vordrozda first explain how he came by this document? Illegally obtained evidence cannot be admitted in this council!"

Vortrifrani stood up. "My lords, this is nothing but another attempt to cover up-"

The imperial cavalry spear thudded into the ground. "Count Vorob'yev has made a valid point," began Georgos. He stopped dead as Gregor raised a hand from the dais.

Vortala watched as Georgos whispered desperately to Gregor. Gregor's face was perfectly expressionless. Only those who knew him well would recognize the anger beneath that apparent calm. Finally Georgos straightened up, and – oh, the fool - looked at Aral. Gregor's eyes narrowed.

There were no signals this time. Aral sat in stony silence, staring straight ahead. "This council," Georgos announced at last with obvious reluctance, "will admit as evidence the document presented by Count Vordrozda."

Vordrozda's lips curled into a smile as the council erupted in chaos. Count Vortala watched, sickened, as the Lord Guardian tried in vain to restore order. They didn't even pretend to listen to him. After all, he had just made himself a target.

Count Vorkosigan ignored all the people trying to mob him and walked straight out of the door.

* * *

Aral didn't even turn from the window as the float chair entered his office. "How many votes have we lost today?"

"At least seven have switched sides entirely," Vortala told him. "Five of them are your own party members. Another three have decided to abstain." Aral said nothing. "You can rest assured that Vordrozda will be working on the rest of them all night. Aral, you idiot, what have you done?"

Aral remained silent. "Are Vordrozda's charges true?"

_That _made him turn around. "No."

"Can you prove it?" asked Vortala. "Yes," Aral admitted reluctantly.

"Then stop being stubborn, Vorkosigan. Put your pride aside for once. Open your accounts before the council. Can't you see Vordrozda's handed you the perfect opportunity to make him look like an idiot and win sympathy at the same time?"

Aral shook his head in frustration. "It's not that simple."

Something in Aral's voice stopped him. "Aral," he asked slowly. "What have you done, boy?"

Aral walked across the room and sat down behind the desk. "It was a charitable donation," he said at last, looking not at Vortala but at the wall behind him. "For certain children at the Imperial Service Orphanage."

Vortala stared at him in surprise. Aral? Well, no wonder he didn't want that coming out in public, but… Aral? He would never have thought…

"Sixteen children," continued Aral, apparently speaking more to himself than to anyone else.

Vortala's jaw dropped. "Six…_sixteen?_" he 's lips twitched just a little. "No, it's not what you think. They're children of our soldiers, born at Escobar."

"But we had no women serving… oh." He thought for a moment. "Oh, shit," he amended.

"Quite," agreed Aral. "Now if I explain where the money went, Vordrozda will claim I'm lying, or that the orphanage is a front, or something. And then the council will order an investigation, and that will bring out the whole story of the conduct of our troops at Escobar, and the reason for that conduct. And once Gregor starts searching in that pile, he could find… things that everyone will be better off if he doesn't find."

What things, Vortala wondered silently, looking at Aral's tired face. Knowing that his father was a sadistic madman – well, that would not be pleasant. But that couldn't be all, could it? And that meant…

A sudden chill ran down his spine. It meant that all the suspicions he'd had about Escobar, about Aral, about Ezar and Negri, about Prince Serg's suspiciously convenient death – the suspicions he'd kept at the back of his mind because they were too terrifying to think about – all those suspicions were true. _Aral, _he wondered, looking in sudden horror at the man before him, _what did they make you do?_

And if that was true, then the last thing they needed right now was for anyone, especially Gregor, to start asking questions about Escobar.

"You idiot," he managed at last. "If you didn't want this becoming public, why did you do it? You just had to interfere, didn't you?"

"I gave my word to protect them," answered Aral quietly. "All of them."

"You _did_. You bought their lives. There was no need… oh, never mind," he said, as Aral began to reply. "No point arguing over it now." Even though Aral had kept Ezar's secret for eighteen years, he couldn't keep it forever. Gregor had absolute access to information, and sooner or later he would find out the truth about his father. And then he would put the pieces of the puzzle together and discover... no, Vortala decided, he couldn't blame Aral for wanting to put off that day as long as possible.

"No, no point," agreed Aral. "So, do you believe me, or do you still suspect me of treason?"

"Don't be a fool, boy," Vortala snorted. "I never suspected anything of the sort. If you were a traitor, Gregor would be dead by now, and you'd have covered your tracks so well that all your enemies would be on trial instead of your son. I don't know which insult is greater – the accusation that you would take the Imperium, or the accusation that you'd do it so badly."

"Ah," said Aral, smiling humorlessly again, "you forget. It's _Miles _who messed up my perfect treason plot."

Ah, yes. Miles. "When this is over," Vortala told him, "regardless of what happens, I swear I am going to give that boy of yours the worst shaking he's ever received in his life." Alas, the good old days when he carried a cane and could use it for whacking young Vor imbeciles across the shins were long gone.

Aral's face was grim. "You'll have to wait in line."

* * *

That evening, Count Vortala waited, not at the head of a long line of well-armed men ready to knock some sense into Miles Vorkosigan as he dearly wished, but alone in the museum of Vorhartung Castle. In a glass case before him sat the tanned and cured scalp of Mad Emperor Yuri, on loan to the museum from his own personal collection. He had had no wish to keep the hideous thing in his house. He neither wanted nor needed reminders of that historic day, permanently engraved even in his fading memory. The day on which he and nineteen other men - and one child - had cut an old and helpless man to pieces as he cried for mercy, just one floor above in this very castle.

He had spent fifty years trying to forget the screams that still rang in his head. Fifty years fighting to make sure that no such thing would happen on Barrayar ever again.

"If you were waiting for the Emperor," said a mocking voice behind him, "I'm afraid you're out of luck. Gregor is busy today."

Slowly, he turned the float chair around to face the green-liveried man leaning against the closed door of the Emperor's office. "Count Vordrozda," he replied. Vordrozda bowed silently. "You can tell the Emperor, then, that I will wait here until he sees me."

"Wait as long as you wish," said Vordrozda, a smug smile spreading across his face. "You will find that the Emperor sees only who I wish him to see. He hears only what I wish him to hear. So perhaps it would be worth your while to talk to me instead. It's the closest you're going to get."

"There is absolutely nothing that I wish to say to you," Vortala answered stiffly.

"Oh, but I do have something to say to _you_," replied Vordrozda. "I'd quite forgotten you, you know. Vorkosigan surprised me when he brought you out of the woodwork. You and the Lord Guardian have played a nice little game for him, much better than I expected. I have to say, I'm impressed." Vortala sat in silence. "But you do see - it's over now. There is nothing you can do that will prevent me from winning tomorrow's vote. And those who stand against me then may find themselves regretting it later. It might well profit you, at this point, to consider just where your loyalties lie."

If only he were twenty years younger and could get out of the damned chair, thought Vortala, he might have challenged the man to a duel there and then. "The Lord Regent earned our loyalty with sixteen years of service to Barrayar. That loyalty is not something you can buy."

"No?" smiled Vordrozda. "Others in this council are not so stubborn. I find loyalty is quite easy to buy. It's merely a question of being able to pay enough."

"And just how would you have acquired enough to pay that price?" asked Vortala softly. "I would dearly love to see _your_ accounts brought out before this council, someday."

"How unfortunate, then, that you never will." Vordrozda's eyes gleamed. "I warn you, old man. Barrayar is going to change, and the change starts tomorrow. Consider yourself fortunate that you have one last chance to be on the winning side. Or else when I'm finished with the Vorkosigans, you'll be the first against the wall."

"More powerful men than you have made that threat and failed," said Vortala. "Do you think you can frighten _me_, boy? I was there when Yuri Vorbarra died." He gestured to the scalp. "Do you see that? I was the one who took it off its wearer. While he was still alive. That is what we do to men like you on Barrayar." He lowered his voice. "I wonder where all your body parts will be, a year from now?"

Vordrozda inclined his head. "I'll do you the courtesy of passing your words on to the Emperor," he replied smoothly. "He'll be interested to hear them, I'm sure."

Vortala looked up at him in disgust. "Yes, you do that. Go back to Gregor and play your mind games. They will not help you win this vote. Lord Vorkosigan is innocent, and he will prove it."

"Ah, but Lord Vorkosigan is not here to prove anything. Why not, I wonder?" Vordrozda smiled coldly. "You still have one day. Think about it."

Vortala watched him go, and tried to imagine what would happen if that man was allowed to succeed. It would be the old Barrayar all over again, the Barrayar of Grishnov and Vorrutyer and the secret police, where politics was a synonym for corruption and murder and false charges, the Barrayar where a few corrupt men could hoard power in their hands and undo the peace that an entire generation had paid in blood to create.

As he made his way out of the castle and to the waiting groundcar in silence, his only hope was that he would not live long enough to see it pass.

"Count Vortala," said a soft voice behind him. He turned to see Admiral Vorlakial. Before he could ask the chief of the General Staff what he was doing standing alone before the gates of Vorhartung Castle, Vorlakial slipped into the car beside him and closed the door.

"Surely," Vortala began as they started moving, "The chief of the General Staff rates a car of his own."

"Walking is good for health," answered Vorlakial, "and I'm an old man, prone to sudden and unreasonable fancies. Such as an irrational dislike for Service Security drivers who think I can't see the horus-eyes in their pockets."

"I see," said Vortala slowly. When had it become that bad? "And how are things at headquarters?"

"Quiet," answered Vorlakial, an undercurrent of anger in his voice. "The government hasn't functioned for the last one month. Until your lot get their act together, we're free to sit around and watch the Cetagandans dance with joy. And how are things in the Council of Counts?

Vortala told him. He listened grimly to the recitation. "I'm not surprised," he said when the tale had finished. "The treason charge is nonsense, of course. We know that. And we have enough sources inside ImpSec, even now, to know that Admiral Vorkosigan's arrest is planned. Very soon."

Vortala was suddenly alert, a thousand questions in his head. He asked the most important one. "Who exactly is 'we'?"

"The General Staff," answered Vorlakial. "With the exception of Admiral Hessman and his friends."

In other words, almost all of it. What was really going on at headquarters? "I take it your commander-in-chief isn't included in 'we' either."

"No, he isn't," agreed Vorlakial. "Gregor has shown what kind of leader he is. It's clear who will truly rule the Empire if Barrayar is left in his hands. And the Council of Counts – excuse me - is full of fickle men, greedy and thoughtless, incapable of seeing anything beyond their own self-interest. But Aral Vorkosigan still has allies where it truly matters, and I suspect that you are one of them."

Vortala was silent. Yes, it had started already. This was the old Barrayar.

"Let me make myself clear," said Vorlakial at last. "The space forces will not sit by and permit the arrest of Admiral Vorkosigan. They will do whatever is necessary to prevent it. You may be retired, but you still command public respect. Your support would be exceedingly useful for us. And your opposition would be extremely inconvenient."

"I have only one question," said Count Vortala, as his armsman brought the car to a halt in front of Imperial Service headquarters. "Why am I having this conversation with you, and not with Admiral Vorkosigan himself?"

Vorlakial shrugged. "You know him. He's being stubborn. He won't acknowledge the need for this until he has no other choice. But if Vordrozda continues the way he's started, none of us will be left with any easy choices. And when all choices are equally hard, we must choose for the good of Barrayar."

"The good of Barrayar," repeated Vortala dumbly. The good of Barrayar. How many crimes had been committed over the centuries for those four words?

What was he going to do about this? What would Ezar have wanted him to do about this?

No, dammit. Ezar was the one who'd gotten them all into this mess in the first place. Scheming Ezar and his deranged son and his idiot grandson. Forget what Ezar would have wanted. What did he want?

* * *

An hour before the vote, Vortala found Aral seated before the comconsole in his office. He switched it off and looked up. "Gregor has refused to see Cordelia," he said without preamble.

Vordrozda had dug his claws deeper than any of them had realized. "So we've lost," said Vortala. Aral nodded in reluctant agreement. "What are we going to do now?"

Aral stood up and looked at the wall with the abstracted expression that meant he was thinking hard. "I don't know," he admitted reluctantly. "I truly don't know. What would you do in my place?"

"Do you really want my advice, boy?" asked Vortala. "I warn you, you won't like it when you hear it." When Aral nodded, he went on, "Are we being overheard?"

"Not in this room," Aral assured him. "My armsmen cleared the bugs out before you came."

"Then," said Vortala quietly, forcing his voice to remain steady, "my advice to you is this. Take the General Staff up on its offer."

There was a long silence in the room. "You are seriously advocating that I commit treason?" Aral aked in disbelief.

"For the good of Barrayar, yes," he answered. "Don't pretend that you haven't been seriously considering it. I know you, boy. I know you have twenty contingency plans for everything. Don't pretend this isn't one of them."

Aral took a deep breath. "I will not pretend that it isn't," he said slowly, "but no. I will not support a mutiny against the Emperor – against Gregor. It will not be done in my name. You and I fought for sixteen years to clean out the violence from Barrayaran politics. I will not be the one to bring it back."

"Do nothing, then," Vortala snapped. "Do nothing, and let Gregor sign the death warrant. Let your son be arrested, brought back here in chains, and starved to death in the great square. Can you watch it, Vorkosigan?" He didn't give Aral a chance to answer. "It doesn't matter if you can, because you won't. You'll be under arrest yourself, your government disgraced and discredited, your coalition broken into a hundred squabbling factions, leaving Vordrozda and his cronies to step into the power vacuum and rule Barrayar. And what do you think will happen to Barrayar then, left in the hands of an incompetent Emperor controlled by unscrupulous men, who will stop at nothing to consolidate their power? They'll sink their claws so deep into Gregor the boy will forget everything you and Cordelia ever taught him. Do you think they'll be satisfied with Miles' life, and Illyan's, and yours? It will be Vorrutyer and Grishnov, all over again. There's still time, Aral. You can still save Barrayar from that. As you saved it before."

Aral looked up sharply, all the blood draining from his face in an instant. "You know that– how? Did Ezar tell you?"

"No. I figured it out. It wasn't all that difficult." Vortala lowered his voice. "It would not be your fault, boy. It's Gregor who's responsible for bringing us all to this point. Everyone can see the corner he's forced you into."

That hit a nerve. "I think," Aral said slowly, his eyes on the floor, "I think I may have failed badly with Gregor. Not half as badly as Ezar failed with Serg, there is no comparison at all, but… badly enough."

Vortala took the opening. "Yes, you failed," he agreed, forcing back his conscience at the sight of Aral's pained expression. His conscience could wait till tomorrow. Aral must be made to see reason today. "Will you now compound your failure the way Ezar did? Ezar's failure was not ruthlessness. It was inaction. Had he brought himself to do what was necessary a decade earlier, ten thousand lives might have been saved. Will you let all those deaths be for nothing?"

Aral was silent. "Act today, while you still have power. Or else what do you think will happen the day Vordrozda makes his bid for the Imperium? It's too late to avoid violence, Aral. All we can do for Barrayar's sake is minimize it."

Aral looked up suddenly, his eyes narrowed in anger. "No_,_" he whispered. "You will not use that what-if argument on me. Ezar used it, and Ezar was wrong. As are you. Vordrozda would like nothing better than to provoke me into making all his lies true. I will not play into his hands."

"What will you do, then?" asked Vortala.

"Wait." he said quietly. "Miles will come home eventually. Either of his own accord or in chains, but he will come. Pray that Gregor won't have him executed without giving him a chance to explain himself. And hope for all our sakes that he has a good explanation."

Vortala was staggered. "Aral, the boy built a mercenary fleet and fought a war with it! And you think he has a _good explanation?_"

"I agree that it would have to be quite a spectacular explanation," Aral admitted.

"So you will pin all your hopes on Miles," he said disbelievingly. Was this the great Vorkosigan strategy? "And what if he doesn't come back? If Gregor doesn't give him a chance, or doesn't believe him? If he doesn't have that spectacular explanation?"

"Then we truly have lost," Aral agreed.

"Aral," he pleaded desperately, "you cannot gamble with the future of Barrayar. Not against odds like this. Ezar would never have taken such a risk."

"If there is one thing I have learned in the last eighteen years," answered Aral, "it is that I am not Ezar Vorbarra."

Vortala saw the expression on Aral's face, and bowed his head in silence. He had known Aral long enough to recognize defeat when he saw it. When he was in that stubborn mood, nothing could move him.

"You're wrong about Ezar, you know," said Aral at last. "Ezar's failure was not inaction. His failure was that he gave up hope. A mistake that we would do well to learn from. We still have one day, and here we sit acknowledging defeat."

Vortala looked up in disbelief. "Only a miracle can save us now, boy," he pointed out.

Aral smiled suddenly, and this time the smile was real. "Miracles have happened to me before."

* * *

There was something approaching desperate prayer in the Lord Guardian's voice as he called Lord Vorkosigan for the final time that morning. The last flicker of hope in his eyes died when no voice broke the familiar silence.

Vordrozda didn't bother to keep the smug smile off his face as he gave his closing speech. Count Vortala looked around the chamber as Vordrozda spoke, watching the sixty men who sat in judgement, their faces turned towards the speaker.

"If our illustrious Prime Minister knew nothing of this plot, then let him produce this 'missing' nephew," Vordrozda declared, his voice heavy with sarcasm. "He says he cannot. And why not?"

In the first row he could see Count Vortrifrani and his radical conservatives, still hungover from their celebration of victory. Counts Vorrutyer and Vorhalas, so preoccupied with their petty personal vengeance that they could see nothing beyond it. Vorbretten and Vorfolse, both progressives, both too terrified to take a stand for what they knew to be right.

"I ask you—is it reasonable that a plot of this magnitude could have been advanced so far by a son with no knowledge by his father?"

And Gregor, the youngest of them all, whose pride and insecurity had made him the greatest danger of them all. They all looked back at him, their expressions ranging from delight to despair, and he knew Miles had lost. He had lost. And more than any other, Barrayar had lost.

"If Lord Vorkosigan is so innocent, why is he not here?"

A voice rang out from the doorway. "That is just the question I propose to make you answer, Count Vordrozda."


End file.
